


Rigor

by PastelWonder



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fatherhood, Fluff, For GingerRoseVSS Prompt - Rigor, Gen, Grand Marshal Hux, Schoolboy Squabbles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:08:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26303176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PastelWonder/pseuds/PastelWonder
Summary: "Well," that accent, the razor-sharp tenor, sounds exactly like it does in Arthur's mind."If it isn't my son, the brawler."
Comments: 12
Kudos: 21





	Rigor

The last thing Arthur remembers is blue skies.

The boys and him had been squabbling. _He and the boys,_ a rigorous tenor chides. They were arguing over rubbish, trivial, stupid little things. Who had better marks and newer boots and the richest father.

Of course, Arthur always won.

He wished to gods sometimes he didn't. That he could be _normal_ , without the weight of the First Confederate Order and a thousand pounds of Arkanian patriarchy pressing down on his neck.

They'd been shuffling in the forest behind Base, playing around and taking the mickey out of each other when it got too seriously too quickly for Arthur to _stop. Think. Consider._ Jameson had said something about him being built like a four year old girl and he'd said something back about Jameson having a raisin for a cock. Must have cheesed Jameson off proper, because his face turned red as a Tattooine turnip and Arthur had felt stinging pride at having won.

Until Jamie spat back, "Well least my mum isn't a filthy _Haysian_."

_Stop. Think. Consider._

It'd all gone out the window when Jamie said that.

Arthur had flown at him - all eighty-two pounds of eleven year old _fury_ \- with a battle cry that would have made his maternal great-grandfather swell with pride.

He wrestled Jamie to the ground.

The first few licks he got in were _glorious_. That calm, murmuring voice, _Stop. Think. Consider_ was miles away from his heart. He heard only the blood rushing through him, his heart pounding in his fists and in his throat, he felt only the creaking grit of his teeth and the slamming impacts and his own snarl. The shouts and jeers of the other blokes were a smothered, underwater sound. He saw the face of his beautiful mother. Calling him, "Arthur-baby" and holding him to her soft, warm breast.

He felt _righteous_ , he felt _alive_ , til Jamie got the better of him. Rolled them over and punched out Arthur's lights.

Last thing he remembers is staring up at the panes of blue sky through the skeletal reach of the trees and thinking, _"Dad's gonna kill me."_

The clip of his sire's measured, unmistakable stride coming down the hall is a sobering sound.

_Stop. Think. Consider._

Pfft. Well...

He stares miserably at his limp hands in his lap - tattletale knuckles ripped up - and his scuffed up boots.

The immaculate ones of his sire stop practically toe-to-toe with him.

He's too ashamed to look up.

"Well," that accent, that razor-sharp tenor, sounds exactly like it does in Arthur's mind. He watches large black-gloved hands - hands which Arthur can still feel around his younger waist lifting him high, or cradled around his own small grip to coach his hold on a cricket bat - fold imperiously behind his sire's back. "If it isn't my son, the brawler."

_Strange_. Arthur's listening for the contempt and disappointment but he can't hear it.

He hears... _pride_.

"Your Headmaster has informed me of the - _nature_ \- of the dispute." Unexpectedly, his sire kneels.

Even in half, his father is _massive_. Broad shouldered. As tall as an Arkanian oak. Next to Mum he's a giant. Kneeling now in the Academy's bright, ancient hall, he is a Dreadnaught. All Imperial greatcoat and medaled breast and black mass. _The Marshal_.

He smiles. It is the razor-toothed smile of Haysian mountain cats.

His blue eyes gleam.

"Well done, boy."

Tenderly, he claps Arthur's knee. Gives him a little shake to rouse him out of the _shock_. Arthur's heart sputters, skips and turns over. Just like the engines Mum coaxes back to life.

He looks into the eyes of his father, and sees only approval. Only love.

"Well done."

A microfic by PastelWonder

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